Chapter 5
Katniss's new schedule was pretty sweet, it had made the decision to spend six months in New South Wales even easier. Four shifts a week, alternating days and nights every other week, and only one weekend a month. It was fewer hours than she'd logged back in the Seam, and much more regular, dependable. It was going to leave her tons of time to explore and to meditate and to figure out her life. Once she got enough sleep to kick this residual jet lag, that was.
But that wasn't going to happen today.
Shrill shrieks wafted through her bedroom window and she groaned, abandoning any thought of a nap. Her first four shifts had been overnights, which hadn't helped in getting her circadian rhythm reset to Australian time. Worse, she'd had a terrible time sleeping between the new bed and the new surroundings and the mental overload of the new systems at work. Not to mention how much harder she had to listen to her patients and coworkers to figure out the Australian accent and the different way they phrased things, and how truly exhausting that was.
Her only respite had been watching her backyard neighbour's workouts. He was remarkably consistent, doing shirtless pull ups or running on his treadmill around six every evening, providing her with glimpses of his golden body through the wall of windows in his sunroom. And after encountering that cute but terribly confusing baker again, her backyard neighbour's shenanigans had become a respite of another type, where she could use her imagination to superimpose a wide, dimpled grin and smiling blue eyes onto her neighbour's half-naked form. She'd have liked to enjoy more of that respite, but it turned out that the electricity differences in Australia ran deeper than just the different shaped plug, and she'd fried her magic wand.
That's something they didn't warn you about in the Lonely Planet guides.
With a sigh, Katniss climbed out of bed and wandered over to the window. Her neighbour was outside this evening, and sadly wearing a shirt. He also wasn't alone. Though she'd never before seen any sign of anyone else living in his little house, his yard was full of children.
Maybe he shared custody, she mused, though if that was the case his house must be a lot bigger than hers. She couldn't imagine fitting that many kids into her tiny cottage.
She watched as he ran, holding a football while several giggling children attempted to tackle him. It was adorable, wholesome, like a soap commercial or something, all of those blonde heads in the sunshine.
Katniss was just about to turn away when her hot beefcake neighbour threw his arms up in some sort of touchdown dance, and a flash of white bandage stretching the length of his forearm caught her eyes.
No. Freaking. Way.
She was downstairs and pushing open the sliding glass door to her yard before she could even think about what she was doing.
It was him, it was definitely him. The two men she'd been fantasising about, her beefcake neighbour and the hot firefighting baker, were one and the same. What were the odds?
He didn't notice her at first, not until she was most of the way to the fence. Then he caught sight of her and did an almost cartoonish double take.
"Well I'll be," he said softly, approaching, seeming not even to notice the weight of multiple kids hanging off him like he was a jungle gym.
"Uncle Peeta," one of the kids whined. "You're going the wrong way."
"If it isn't the mysterious Doctor Everdeen," Peeta said, leaning against their shared fence, his eyes raking down her body. Only then did Katniss remember she was braless under the thin tank she'd worn to nap in. Oh well, she thought. There wasn't much to see anyway. Though the way Peeta grinned appreciatively made her wonder if he'd disagree.
"Are you really a doctor?" a little voice piped up. Katniss glanced over Peeta's shoulder and her breath caught in her throat. Dangling from his back and looking at her with wide blue eyes was a curly haired version of Prim.
It took a few beats for her brain to catch up. The little girl waiting patiently for her to answer couldn't be more than six or seven. Similar colouring to Katniss's sister, but a generation—and half a planet—removed. Finally she caught her breath. "I am," she said simply.
"You don't look like a doctor," the little girl said. Her tongue poked out where her two front teeth should have been.
Katniss narrowly bit back a scowl. "Oh?" she said. "And what do doctors look like?"
She fully expected to have a discussion about misogyny with a first grader, but the kid surprised her. "Old," she said, freckled nose wrinkling. "You're not old," she said.
"And you're pretty," another voice piped up. Katniss leaned over the fence to find a second little girl with exactly the same smile but dark pigtails. Sisters, one fair, one dark. Closer in age than she and Prim had been, but so very similar otherwise. "I like your hair," the second little girl said.
"Thank you," Katniss said, pulling at the end of her French braid a little self-consciously. It was coming unwoven and probably sticking up everywhere from trying to sleep on it. "I like your hair too," she said, and the child beamed.
"I'm Stella. Will you braid my hair like that?" she asked, and before Katniss could answer, her sister was asking the same thing, begging in stereo.
Other little voices joined the fray, questions for Katniss, admonishments for Uncle Peeta to rejoin the game, an amazing amount of high-pitched noise.
"Oi, knock it off you lot," Peeta said, but gently, and with such fondness in his voice that something warm and bright flared in her chest. "Charlie," he continued, addressing one of the bigger boys. "I know you found the icy poles when you were perving in the kitchen earlier." Katniss had no idea what that meant, but the way six little people suddenly stampeded towards Peeta's house indicated they did.
"I didn't realise you had your own football team over here," Katniss said with a smirk.
Peeta laughed. He had a really great laugh, warm, a little husky. "Few shy of an Aussie rules side," he said. "You wanna help me add to the crew? We could get started now. You and me, Doc. We'd make heaps of real pretty midfielders together."
She froze, uncertain, until he winked, and she understood he was flirting. Peeta Mellark was definitely a flirt. Whatever shy side she'd thought she'd seen in him must've been her imagination because this guy oozed self confidence.
Katniss could work with that. Guys like that, players, they didn't have expectations she couldn't live up to. They didn't add complications she wasn't prepared for.
"Mighty forward, Hotshot, when you don't even know my first name," she said, smirking.
His grin widened. "I can just keep calling you Doc Beauty…"
Katniss laughed, surprising herself. It had been a very long time since she'd laughed at anything.
Peeta's cocky smile fell a bit, a flicker of vulnerability in his blue eyes. He was an enigma, this brawny blonde beefcake.
One she thought she might like to know better.
"Katniss," she said, sticking her hand over the fence. His smile widened.
"Nice to meet you for real, Katniss," he said, taking her hand in his much larger one. She liked the way he said her name, liked the warmth and solidity of his skin under her own.
"Third time's a charm."
Peeta held her hand longer than was strictly necessary, and when he finally released her, she felt sorry for the loss.
"They're my brothers' kids," he said, gesturing over his shoulder. "But you'll be hearing a lot of them. Sorry for that. I'd have kept them quiet if I'd known you were sleeping." He gestured to the tank top and shorts she was wearing, bare toes curled in the dry grass.
"It's fine," she said. "I wasn't asleep anyway. And I shouldn't be trying to nap, I switch to days on Monday. But I'm still jet lagged like crazy and trying to adjust to the new time zone." And there she was, oversharing with blondie again.
But he just nodded. "I hear you," he said. "I mean, I'm not jet lagged, but early mornings at the bakery and late nights with the firies…" he trailed off, and for the first time Katniss noticed the faint purple circles under his eyes, like bruises in the evening light.
"And long afternoons with your nieces and nephews."
His expression softened at that, different from the cocky smile. "Hard to feel stuffed when they're keeping me on my toes," he said. "Do you have kids?" Katniss rolled her eyes and Peeta grinned. "Nieces, nephews? Siblings?"
Her heart hurt at the question. Prim loved kids. She would have been the best mother, calm and kind. Katniss shook her head, glancing away, and tried to stuff the pain back down.
Peeta was looking at her strangely, like she was a puzzle that needed to be solved. She wanted to tell him to stop, that she wasn't broken, that she was just fine, thank you. But his back door slid open and sticky-faced children spilled out, like so many clowns from a car, distracting them both.
The older kids scattered about the yard, but the littlest one, a boy of maybe three, came straight for Peeta, a melting popsicle in each chubby fist. "I brought one for you," he lisped, and Peeta lifted the little guy up into his arms.
"Thank you, Paddy," Peeta said, "but you have two here," he tapped the little guy's hands, "and at least one more here," he danced his fingers over the large purple stain decorating the front of Patrick's shirt, and the child giggled.
"One for her," Patrick said shyly, not quite looking at Katniss.
"Oh," Katniss said softly, and that unfamiliar warmth flared in her chest again. She'd forgotten, maybe, how sweet kids could be. It had been a very long time since she'd been around a little person outside of a professional capacity. "Thank you, Paddy," she said, repeating the name Peeta had used.
He handed a yellow popsicle over the fence, the wooden stick stained and sticky, then buried his face in Peeta's neck. She'd never been one to fawn over muscled men holding babies, but there was something about this man, with his bulging biceps and his ashy blonde hair just a little too long, curling in the slanting light, cradling a little guy who looked just like him, that made her feel things she had no business feeling. Not for someone who in six months time she'd never see again.
Peeta was grinning, the smile she remembered seeing briefly at his bakery, and again in the hospital before he'd been distracted by the nurse, the one that seemed real and deep. It confused the hell out of her. Time to make an exit.
"I uh, I should leave you to your evening," she said.
Peeta raised his eyebrows, and the soft smile was replaced by something more wicked. "I can help you with that jet lag," he said lowly, then he licked a long line up the side of his melting treat, holding her eyes as he did. "Wake you up real slow." Another long lick. "Get your blood pumping for the day." The tip of his tongue swirled, and Katniss shivered. "Waddaya say, Doc Beauty? Shall I sneak over the fence tonight?" He winked suggestively.
Katniss rolled her eyes. "In your dreams, Hotshot," she said, and turned for the house.
"Yes you will be," he called after her, and she grinned. He'd be in her dreams too, no doubt about that.